


transmogrify

by wonuza



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Fairy Tale Curses, Fairy Tale Elements, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, seokhan just barely
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-29
Updated: 2017-10-29
Packaged: 2019-01-25 10:40:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12529476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wonuza/pseuds/wonuza
Summary: in which wonwoo has an incurable disease, soonyoung is determined to cure said incurable disease, and stealing from a witch has consequences, no matter how pure your intentions.(a fairy tale, kind of, with a happy ending, kind of.)





	transmogrify

**Author's Note:**

> the curse in this is a slightly modified version of the curse from ladyhawke, a movie i'm quite sure 99% of seventeen fans are too young to have seen. i think that's all i have to say this time. have fun :)

Being cursed, Soonyoung and Wonwoo agree, is not ideal.

But it could be worse.

Most victims of the witch that got them ended up dead or with an affliction even more unpleasant, so when she comes after them they don’t bother running or hiding because they figure it won’t do them any good.  To hear Soonyoung tell it, there was thunder and lightning, while Wonwoo just remembers wind howling, leaving trees bare and branches scattered across the forest floor—they aren’t sure who’s right anymore, and when it comes down to it, does it really matter?  The details they agree on are the important ones:  when she comes through the door, Soonyoung plants himself squarely between her and Wonwoo, because it’s not Wonwoo she’s after; Soonyoung doesn’t hesitate to respond when she demands to know why he’d done something as ill-advised as stealing from her, his voice doesn’t shake and he doesn’t flinch or look away, because he doesn’t regret it; Wonwoo reaches forward and grabs his hand because he’s certainly not letting Soonyoung go down alone.  She goes silent once she has her answer, looks carefully around the room, and snaps her fingers twice.  The air shimmers around them for just a second, and then nothing.  She leaves and it’s quiet.

  
_ix.  wonwoo_

Wonwoo berates Soonyoung for nearly an hour after she’s gone—he hadn’t told Wonwoo how he’d gotten the dragon scales, and the stupid spell he was working on wasn’t nearly important enough to have stolen from a witch, and they could have just kept selling their potions and enchantments to passersby for a little while longer and gotten some  _legally_.  Soonyoung is very quick to point out that dragons are extinct, and ‘a little while’ would likely have been years, and it doesn’t matter anyway, because he’s already done it.

“And it  _is_  important enough,” Soonyoung says firmly, and, really, how can Wonwoo stay angry?

They spend the rest of the evening worrying over what she had done to them:  Wonwoo raids his garden and scrambles to mix up preventative potions while Soonyoung sets every ward he can think of around their tiny cottage, but they can’t find any discernible effects—

That is, until the sun goes down, and Soonyoung turns into a cat.

It takes a second for Wonwoo to process what he’s just seen—it happens in the blink of an eye, in a barely there puff of shimmering purple smoke, one second Soonyoung’s there and the next he’s replaced by a sleek, orange cat.  Wonwoo’s first bemused thought as he stares is how the color of the cat’s fur doesn’t even match Soonyoung’s hair.  He gives a long sigh then, as cat-Soonyoung meows curiously, then frantically.  His hands shake as he rummages in the clutter on his desk until he finds a small mirror, and he tries his best to steady them as he holds it down so Soonyoung can see himself.  “Good thing I’m not a dog person, right Soon-ah?” he says with a sad smile.  Soonyoung curls up on the floor and won’t look at him.  “Don’t be like that.  We’ll fix it, it’s fine.  Come here.”

So Wonwoo holds Soonyoung up to their bookshelf and lets him paw at all the books on transmutation.  He’d never been as good at it as Soonyoung—he’d never been as good at any magic as Soonyoung—but that didn’t really matter now, did it?  Clearly he has his work cut out for him, and if he can’t manage it, he’ll have to find someone who can.  He reads all night, burning his candles down to nubs, and it’s just about dawn when Soonyoung, who has been sleeping on his feet under the desk, suddenly becomes himself again.  The dull thud and subsequent yelp after Soonyoung tries to stand too quickly and hits his head on the bottom of the desk makes Wonwoo jump.  Soonyoung climbs to his feet, looking down at himself and then smiling at Wonwoo, who has just enough time to smile back before he feels magic take hold of him and watches Soonyoung’s face fall from happy to confused to terrified.

The sun rises, Soonyoung is himself, and Wonwoo is a crow.

Soonyoung breathes very hard for just a second, then drops back to the floor and starts crying.  “I just wanted to help you,” he sobs when Wonwoo nudges his arm with his beak.  “I was only trying to help, and now you’re even worse off than when I started.  You must hate me.”

If Wonwoo could talk, he would tell Soonyoung he was an idiot.  An idiot for stealing from a witch, and an idiot for doing it to try to save him.  What he wouldn’t say is that there was no cure for his disease, and even if there was, honestly, what were the chances Soonyoung would be the one to find it?  Not that he isn’t smart, because he is, extremely, and one of the most talented sorcerers Wonwoo has ever met; it’s just that there was probably a handsome prince on a quest somewhere who was a more likely candidate.  But he wouldn’t say that.  He would just call Soonyoung an idiot:  for being so foolishly brave, and so stupidly selfless, and most of all, thinking Wonwoo could ever hate him.

(Cure or not, he would choose Soonyoung over any prince.)

But he can’t talk, because he is a crow, so he has to settle for various crow noises that feel like they don’t belong in his throat, and hope that they’re at least vaguely comforting.  He flies—weird—up onto the desk, and pecks lightly at the book he’d left off on.  Soonyoung wipes his eyes and stands before slumping into the chair, looks down at his lap for a few moments before sighing and beginning to sort through Wonwoo’s notes.  It only takes a few minutes for him to look up slowly and shake his head at crow-Wonwoo, who cocks his own head to the side.  “I don’t know, Wonwoo, I don’t know,” he says, leaning his face into his hands.  “All she did was _snap her fingers_.  She’s a real witch, she has real magic.  I’m not like her.”  He uncovers his eyes and his voice is barely a whisper when he speaks again.  “I don’t think I can fix us.”

Wonwoo lets out a low, annoyed caw, and Soonyoung smiles, almost.

“I know, I know.”  He reaches out and smooths the feathers on crow-Wonwoo’s head.  “How many times have I argued with you about _real_  magic.  Can’t you let me self-deprecate, just this once?  I feel like the situation demands it.”  Wonwoo gives a dissatisfied squawk, and Soonyoung laughs despite himself.

When the sun goes down that night, and Wonwoo returns to himself, they look at each other as they realize exactly what’s happening.  Soonyoung cries again, clings to Wonwoo like he hasn’t seen him in years (it kind of feels that way) and Wonwoo strokes his hair and shushes him as he repeats “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, I’ve ruined us, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean for this—” until he’s a cat again.  Wonwoo scoops him up into his arms and scratches his head, blinking back tears of his own as the weight of their current circumstance settles over their home like a dark, heavy storm cloud.

Still.

They’re alive, and they’re together.  That’s always been enough.

  
_i.  soonyoung_

They meet, as most people do, by chance.  They’re both sixteen, and Soonyoung is apprenticing for a sorcerer living in a tall tower on the edge of a dense forest, but it could have been any sorcerer, in any tower, in any forest.  It just happened to be the one a few miles north of the tiny village that happened to hold the magic shop that happened to be owned by Wonwoo’s parents.  The sorcerer could have sent Soonyoung to the east or the west for supplies, he could have not sent Soonyoung out for supplies at all, but he sent him south, gave him directions straight to the nearest shop that stocked fresh mandrake root, and, consequently, straight to Wonwoo.

The first time Soonyoung walks through the door, he’s followed by a gust of autumn air that blows through the shop and scatters dozens of pages of some tattered manuscript Wonwoo had been putting in order; it makes Wonwoo huff out an exasperated sigh and glare at Soonyoung, who shoots him an apologetic look.  He walks up to the counter and asks for the mandrake root, which he buys, and he’s about to leave, but something stops him.  It’s his conscience, it turns out—he spins around and walks toward the table in the corner of the shop, where Wonwoo is still on the ground, gathering up his worn out pages.

He stops when he realizes Soonyoung is standing over him, and looks up, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose.  His eyebrows raise expectantly.  “Yes?”

“Can I help?  Since it’s...well, I feel like this is my mess.”

Wonwoo looks at him, the annoyance on his face giving way to vague curiosity.  He shrugs.  “You opened a door at the wrong time.  That doesn’t make it your fault.”  His voice surprises Soonyoung; it’s deep, but much softer than his features.

“Still,” he says, and Wonwoo shrugs again.

“Just be careful,” he warns.  “It’s very old, and very delicate.”

So, with as soft a touch as he can muster, Soonyoung helps Wonwoo collect and then re-order the manuscript.  Wonwoo is gentle too, but not as nervous—he clearly knows what he’s doing.  “What is this, anyway?  Can you read it?”

“No,” Wonwoo confesses.  “It’s to do with alchemy, though.  I think.”

Soonyoung wonders why Wonwoo is here, tending to these books he can’t understand, wonders if he’s apprenticing for someone too, and asks him as much.

He shakes his head.  “My parents own the shop.  I can’t do magic.”

“Anyone can do magic,” Soonyoung retorts.

“Sure, small things.  But I wasn’t born with it.  It’s not the same.”

Soonyoung makes a small noise of acknowledgment, and they don’t say much else.  They finish after a bit, and Wonwoo thanks Soonyoung, and Soonyoung leaves with a small wave and a smile.

Every few days, though, he returns with a new list of supplies, and as the lists get bigger, Wonwoo offers to help him carry his things back to the tower.  Soonyoung doesn’t know why Wonwoo would want to lug books and bat wings for miles only to have to walk back to town by himself, but who is he to argue?  And if there are days the sorcerer sends a light list and Soonyoung spends his own money on things he can’t carry by himself, well.  It’s only because they’re things he needed anyway.  Eventually, the sorcerer does start teaching Soonyoung, and though he enjoys learning magic, it’s those trips into the village that he finds himself looking forward to; the hour or so he gets to spend alone with Wonwoo.

Before he knows it, months have passed that way, and even when Soonyoung thinks Wonwoo _must_ know he’s far past levitation in his studies and could easily enchant his supplies to float back to the tower, he still slings his bag over his shoulder and hefts his crates into his arms all the same, looking expectantly at Wonwoo, unable to stop himself from beaming when Wonwoo follows suit.

Soonyoung learns fast, and improves faster.  Every time he returns to the shop he has something new to show Wonwoo:  one day he changes the color of his robe, the next he fixes a crack in Wonwoo’s glasses, the next he kneels down and taps the ground with his wand and sprouts a cluster of white peonies.  Wonwoo is always impressed, and Soonyoung tries to keep some semblance of modesty while positively preening under Wonwoo’s praise.

“You’re going to give me a complex, Wonwoo.”

Wonwoo grins.  “I can’t help it.  Not many people in the village can do real magic, and you...you can do _real_ magic.  I’ve never seen it up close.”  Soonyoung fixes him with an unimpressed glare.  “What?”

“You’re always going on about ‘real magic.’” Soonyoung scolds.  “As if there aren’t plenty of things you can do that I can’t.  You know tons more about potions than I do, _and_ herbalism—”

“Herbalism is just plants, Soonyoung.  That’s not real magic.”

Soonyoung adjusts his bag, huffing a little.  “It’s not like there’s just one kind of magic in the whole world, Wonwoo.”

  
_x.  wonwoo_

Cursed life takes some adjusting, but they settle in as best they can.  None of the counter-curses Soonyoung tries work, but he keeps trying anyway—what else can he do?  Day and night barely hold meaning for them anymore—the sun rises, the sun sets, one of them is human, one isn’t—but it could really be so much worse.  Wonwoo thinks reading with cat-Soonyoung curled up in his lap is much better than no Soonyoung at all, even if it’s not nearly as good as having human-Soonyoung snuggled up against him.  Crow-Wonwoo is much better at catching salamanders when Soonyoung needs them for spells, although he misses human-Wonwoo’s indignant whines when they would slip out of his grasp for the hundredth time.  It’s not how they planned, but they don’t have a choice—they make the best of it.  It’s almost alright.

Almost.  There are days when Soonyoung cries so much he can’t leave their bed, and Wonwoo brings him wildflowers from the forest to cheer him up; there are nights when Wonwoo stares into space, refusing to eat until Soonyoung rubs against his ankles and meows and hisses enough to wear him down.  Each sunrise, there are roughly 58 seconds where they’re both themselves, and each sunset, about 63.  It’s better than no seconds, Wonwoo thinks, but sometimes it doesn’t feel that way.  On good days Soonyoung will hold Wonwoo’s hand as Wonwoo hurriedly tells him a joke he’s been dying to share, and on bad days they cry and kiss each other hard and apologize over and over.  On very bad days they can barely look at each other.

“What’s flying like?” Soonyoung asks once, on a good day.

Wonwoo’s head tilts to one side as he considers.  “Strange.  It’s like falling?  But backwards.”  Soonyoung laughs.  “What?”

“You looked so much like your crow self just then,” he says, then pulls his face into a pout.  “But it’s so unfair that you can fly and I can’t.  You really got the better end of this deal.”

“Cats are a lot better than crows.  Crows are harbingers of death.”  Wonwoo looks down at his green-stained fingertips, the only sign of his disease (until the other symptoms set in, which could be a month, or a year, or ten, or a second.)

Soonyoung presses his lips together.  “I’m still going to find your cure.  It might take me longer now that I’m a cat half the time, but I’m going to do it.  I promise.”  He huffs.  “I wish that awful witch had at least left me even one of my dragon scales.”

“ _Her_ dragon scales,” Wonwoo says, as Soonyoung disappears and cat-Soonyoung replaces him.

  
_ii.  soonyoung_

Soonyoung goes to the shop one day, and Wonwoo isn’t there.  His mother tells him he’s under the weather, and he doesn’t think anything of it, really, beyond mild disappointment—only the next day, the shop is closed, and when it reopens after a week Wonwoo still isn’t there.  So Soonyoung sneaks out of the tower.  It’s still spring, but it’s unseasonably hot out even as the sun goes down, and the air threatens to smother him.  Lightning streaks across the sky in fractals and Soonyoung counts the seconds between it and the thunder that follows:  just three.  It starts to rain as he reaches the village, and it’s become a downpour as he taps on Wonwoo’s window.  He’s got an umbrella charm up, but he squeezes himself under the teeny awning anyway when Wonwoo appears and opens it.

“Where have you been?” Soonyoung whispers.  He can’t help but smile, seeing Wonwoo for the first time in over a week, but it fades when Wonwoo doesn’t return it; instead, he just looks at Soonyoung for a very long moment, then holds up his right index finger, the end of which is a dull forest green.

Soonyoung’s eyes widen.  He opens his mouth, but no words find their way out.  His umbrella charm fades.

“There’s no cure, you know,” says Wonwoo, looking past Soonyoung instead of at him.

Soonyoung knows.

“Not yet,” he replies fiercely, stepping into Wonwoo’s line of sight.  “They’ll find one.  And if they don’t, I’ll find it myself.”

Wonwoo bites his lip as tears well up in his eyes, and Soonyoung ducks through the window as far as he can to wrap his arms around him.  “It’s okay, Nonu,” he says softly into Wonwoo’s hair.  “It can’t have you.  You’re too—you’re my—I won’t let it.”  He doesn't know what he’s trying to say, even when it gets stuck in his throat and refuses to come out, but it scares him all the same.  He can feel Wonwoo’s breath where his neck meets his shoulder, right on the edge of his shirt collar.  There’s the rolling of thunder, the tapping of the rain on Wonwoo’s roof, the feeling of Wonwoo’s arms around him, the tiny sounds of Wonwoo crying, but all of it seems to come to Soonyoung from miles away, like looking through the wrong end of a telescope.  Wonwoo’s breath on his skin, though—shockingly close, and terrifyingly immediate.  Soonyoung swallows hard, and holds tighter.

  
_xi.  wonwoo_

Most mornings, they wait for sunrise together.  On this particular morning, cat-Soonyoung is napping beside Wonwoo on their bed, and Wonwoo gently nudges him awake so they don’t waste their 58 seconds.  Soonyoung lifts his head, opens his eyes, looks around, and flops back onto the bed with a very long, sad meow.  Real Soonyoung appears facedown on the bed, and Wonwoo pokes at his arm.

“I forgot,” Soonyoung whines into the blankets.  “I woke up and I had _forgotten_.”

Wonwoo chuckles, and Soonyoung turns his head just enough to glare at him.  “Sorry.  I know it isn’t funny.”  He lays down on his back beside Soonyoung.  “It’s awful.”

Soonyoung rolls onto his side.  “I just…still feel human.  When I’m not.”  He reaches out to run his fingers along Wonwoo’s cheek, under his chin, down his neck.  “Do you?”

Wonwoo gives a resigned nod, and then he’s gone.

Soonyoung stares at crow-Wonwoo for a bit, stone-faced and silent.  Wonwoo watches his face subtly shift from blank to furious and he springs out of bed and storms out of their bedroom, grabbing his cloak from its hook by the door.  Wonwoo flies after him—still weird—pretty sure he knows where this is going and determined to stop it.  He lands on a tree branch and squawks as loud as he can, and it gets Soonyoung to turn around and squint up at him.

“I can’t just sit here,” Soonyoung calls up to him, throwing his arms out to his sides.  “I don’t know what else to do!”  He shakes his head and looks down.  “It’s...this is _my_ mess, Wonwoo.”

It’s the first time he’s come close to admitting out loud how guilty he feels.  Wonwoo just wishes he could _talk_ to him.

Instead, Wonwoo follows him.  It takes them hours:  through the woods, to the other side of the village, through more woods, across the river, through another village, through still more woods until finally they reach the witch’s house.  It’s surrounded by a high wall and a solid wooden gate, which Soonyoung knocks on, but there’s no answer.  He calls out, begging for her to listen, but there’s no answer.  It starts to rain as he bangs his fists on the gate as hard as he can, scratching at it until his fingernails split, screaming his throat hoarse—“ _I’m the one who stole from you, he didn’t do anything,”—_ and there’s still no answer.  Wonwoo lands on Soonyoung’s shoulder as his movements slow and he leans his forehead against the gate in defeat.  Wonwoo nips at his ear, but Soonyoung can’t look at him, just throws up an umbrella charm over the both of them.  There are a million things Wonwoo wishes he could say, if he presently possessed the anatomy to allow it.

He tries to squeeze some of them in at sunset.  Soonyoung has stayed in bed for the remainder of the day, and when Wonwoo returns to himself he rushes to kneel down next to him.  “I love you,” he whispers.  “Thank you for trying.  Thank you for everything.  My hero,” he coos, smiling through tears.  Soonyoung gets out of bed, joining Wonwoo on the floor.  He wraps his arms around Wonwoo’s neck.  He doesn’t cry, or say anything.  Wonwoo knows him well enough to be able to tell he wants to apologize, but doesn’t think Wonwoo would let him.

He’s right.

  
_iii.  soonyoung_

As summer begins, Soonyoung’s apprenticeship ends.  He rents a room at the inn in town, does odd jobs for villagers, but he spends most of his time holed up in an alcove in the shop:  practicing, studying, or, as has become his habit as of late, watching Wonwoo.

He’s practically glowing now that he’s back at work, and it’s not that he was ever unfriendly or unhappy, just that—he seems to radiate joy now, practically bursts at the seams with it, and Soonyoung can’t understand it, really.  He supposes the fact that Wonwoo’s disease seems to be at a standstill for now helps, but, still.  Questioning it seems wrong, somehow, because Soonyoung _wants_ Wonwoo to be happy; the most he does is nudge Wonwoo every now and then and quietly ask if he’s alright today, and the answer is always the same.  He’ll look at Soonyoung, half confused, then smile, with this baffled expression like he doesn’t understand the question.   _Of course I am,_ he’ll say.

Soonyoung knows him better than that, though.  Wonwoo may have everyone else fooled, and Soonyoung may not be able to put his finger on it yet, but he can see. He can tell.  Wonwoo is not alright.  Soonyoung thinks maybe Wonwoo is the kind of person who can stay just alright _enough_ , to spite the people who come in and tip-toe around him like he’s contagious (he’s not.) Soonyoung thinks one day Wonwoo might crack under the weight of things, prepares to put him back together if he does.

For now, though, Soonyoung just watches:  blushing every time Wonwoo smiles at someone, falling in love every time Wonwoo glances his way.

They don’t talk about Wonwoo’s disease often, though most of Soonyoung’s time is spent researching it any way he can.  It’s a well-known disease due to the lack of cure and distinctive symptoms, but still a rare one, so first-hand accounts are hard to come by.  Still, Soonyoung seeks out as many people who’ve seen it themselves as he can and asks them everything he can think of.  Most of what he learns, he doesn’t share with Wonwoo, because it’s awful—slowly turning green is the least of Wonwoo’s worries, but Soonyoung doesn’t want to tell him that.  He doesn’t want to tell him how much worse it will get.  He doesn’t need to, anyway; Wonwoo already knows.  Everyone knows.

There’s one woman, though, whose story he does pass on to Wonwoo.  He brings it up gingerly, tells Wonwoo how her husband’s disease appeared in his early twenties, and didn’t resurface until he was well into his sixties.  Soonyoung doesn’t expect Wonwoo to respond, really, and he doesn’t for a minute or so, but then:

“Do you think I’ll last until sixty?”

He says it too casually, and Soonyoung knows better.  He knows Wonwoo too well.  And not well enough.  Before he got sick, Soonyoung thought maybe Wonwoo felt the same way he did, but—Wonwoo seems to love everyone, now, and Soonyoung can’t gauge whether he’s getting the same love as the rest of the world or not.

The question Wonwoo posed has a more immediate answer than any of the ones he’s asking himself, even if it’s not a very good one.  So he replies.  “I don’t know.  There’s no way to tell for sure.  But it hasn’t spread yet,” Soonyoung says, picking up Wonwoo’s hand gently and tracing his fingers with his own.  “And it’s happened before, so it’s not impossible.”  Wonwoo beams at him, but it just makes Soonyoung feel cold.

“Well, even if I don’t have that much time,” Wonwoo says, with a fondness Soonyoung wishes he could interpret, “at least I have you.”

Soonyoung smiles back at him for a moment, but quickly looks down and stumbles his way to a change of subject.  “I’m studying all the remedies they’ve tried, you know.  There are a lot of things that have slowed it down, or helped with one symptom or another.  It’s only a matter of time before they find a real cure.”

“Or you do,” Wonwoo says, squeezing his hand.

Soonyoung’s grin softens, and he sighs imperceptibly.  “Or I do.”

  
_xii.  wonwoo_

Usually, Wonwoo’s nights are spent in or around their cottage, but on rare occasions he does make his way into the village.  He’d always been fairly introverted, liked keeping to himself and those close to him—he didn’t realize how much he’d miss just being able to _talk_ to people whenever he wanted.  Now he can’t even talk with Soonyoung, who was his preferred method of social interaction, so when the silence starts to become more than he can stand, he flies into town before sunset and, once he’s himself, heads off to say hello to whoever’s around.  There’s not usually many people to choose from, because of the time of day, but Wonwoo greets them all the same.

Greets them even though they whisper as soon as he walks away.

Soonyoung has a harder time with the whispering.  He usually comes home from errands and complains to crow-Wonwoo about how he wishes people would at least wait until he’s out of earshot, and Wonwoo understands.  Maybe the reason it’s easier for him is that he’s known most of these people his whole life, or it might be the fact that it’s not _him_ they’re whispering about.  Not that it doesn’t break his heart when he hears people who don’t even know Soonyoung blame him for the curse, but he imagines it’s much, much worse for Soonyoung.

Still, he tries to ignore it, tries to give people the benefit of the doubt instead of wasting his time as a human around other humans seething in anger.  Curses aren’t uncommon, but it’s hard to understand unless you’re in one yourself.

Hard to even _try_ to understand, apparently.

More often than not, though, he doesn’t linger to talk to the townspeople.  He almost always beelines straight for the shop.  His parents had retired to the mountains (they’d taken the news of the curse surprisingly well, but, like Soonyoung, got tired of the whispers,) and the new shopkeeper is one of the few people Wonwoo goes out of his way to see.

The shop assistant, Seokmin, greets him as he comes in.  “Jeonghan’s in the attic if you want to go up,” he calls as he finishes drawing the curtains, then looks toward Wonwoo and winks.  “Hiding the contraband.”

The contraband, as it were, is a frankly enormous stock of supplies and potions, pertaining to all manner of love magic—illegal love magic, but Wonwoo had never been horribly concerned about it.  He and Soonyoung don’t have many friends (Soonyoung did, before the curse, but now not so much,) so Wonwoo’s glad to look over some of the less savory things he sells.  Besides, he knows Jeonghan has a good heart, try as he might to hide it.

Wonwoo glances at the stairs.  “I’ll wait down here, I think.”  There are just too many memories in that attic that turn painful when coupled with the fact that he can’t touch the love of his life.  He moves to sit down at a table.

Seokmin flips the sign on the door to closed and sits down with him.  “So!  Out on the town,” he smiles, and Wonwoo smiles back.  “What’s the occasion?”

He shrugs.  “No occasion.  Just craving human contact.”  He doesn’t say that it’s a bad night.  He doesn’t say if he stayed in that house another second he would scream, doesn’t scream now no matter how much he wants to, because he hates this, he hates all of it, he can’t believe that this is his life.

A laugh echoes from the stairs as Jeonghan makes his way down.  “I bet you are.”  He ties his hair back as he walks, yawning.

Wonwoo gives him a look.  “That’s not what I meant.”

“Right.”  He double checks that Seokmin has locked the door, then joins them.  “Don’t you think Soonyoung would be fine if you went out and found someone to…you know?  It’s been how long now?”

Wonwoo sighs.  “A while.”  Seokmin pouts on Wonwoo’s behalf.

Jeonghan wiggles his eyebrows.  “I’m still more than willing to help out.  Either of you.  Both.”

“And the answer is still thank you, but no.”  Jeonghan shrugs, relaxing back into his chair as Wonwoo continues and conjuring a cup of tea out of thin air.  “Anyway, I do not think Soonyoung would be ‘fine.’ I wouldn’t be if he did that to me.”

“Well, no, because it’s his fault in the first place.“  Jeonghan takes a drink, glancing up at Wonwoo, who glowers darkly at him.  He shakes his head as he swallows.  “Sorry.  I know.  Sorry.”

Another cup of tea gets conjured and pushed gingerly toward Wonwoo.  Jeonghan grins, and Wonwoo fights the urge to roll his eyes.  He likes Jeonghan, he really, really does.  But he doesn’t need this tonight.

He picks up the teacup and Seokmin sighs as some of the tension dispels.  “Wonwoo, I don’t know how you do it,” he says.  “I don’t know if I could.”

“He was trying to help,” Wonwoo says.  He doesn’t know what’s so hard to understand about that.

“He made things worse.”  There's no malice, really, or even judgment in Jeonghan’s tone.  It's more matter-of-fact, like it can't be denied.

Wonwoo laughs, though.  “I was already dying, if you’ll recall.”   Seokmin looks away, uncomfortable, and Wonwoo smiles down at the table.  “Soonyoung doesn’t make things worse.”  It isn’t fair, the way people blame Soonyoung as if he doesn’t already blame himself enough.  It isn’t fair how they all say it like they’re the first and only person who’s thought of it.  Maybe it’s the kind of thing you can only understand if you’re the life Soonyoung risked his own to save.

Jeonghan gives an incredulous shake of his head.  “Love is amazing.”  He leans his chin on his hand, smiling, and glances over toward Seokmin.  “This is why I do what I do.”

There’s a snort of laughter from Seokmin, but Wonwoo is staring down at the table again.  “What we do isn’t love, boss.  It’s all fake.  It’s nowhere near what Wonwoo and Soonyoung have.”  Seokmin pauses, and Wonwoo can almost feel the sympathy and sadness radiating off that one second of silence.  “Most _real_ love doesn’t come close.”

Wonwoo smiles at that, and kisses Soonyoung extra hard at sunrise.

  
_iv.  soonyoung_

It's snowing when Soonyoung hears a tap on the door of his room at the inn.  It’s so light he almost thinks he imagined it, but he gets up to peek out into the hall anyway and throws the door open when he sees Wonwoo, damp and shivering.  When Wonwoo doesn’t say anything, he ushers him in and wraps a blanket around him.  They sit on the floor next to Soonyoung’s enchanted fire and it takes him almost twenty minutes to speak.

“My grandmother died,” he says finally.

Soonyoung leans on him, cheek to shoulder.  “I’m sorry, Nonu.”

“She did so much.  I…” He sounds dazed, blinks slowly.  “You don’t have to be sorry.”  Soonyoung’s brows wrinkle in confusion, and Wonwoo explains even though he can’t see it.  “She died because she was old.”

Soonyoung straightens up.

“I’m not going to get old.”

He doesn’t seem upset, but then, the most upset he’d been was that very first night.  This is different.  Wonwoo looks out the window, absently.  The snow keeps falling, and Wonwoo keeps looking.  Soonyoung waits.  He just seems...resigned.  It’s awful.  “Wonwoo.”   _Talk to me_ , he’s about to say, but Wonwoo keeps going without him needing to.

“My parents didn’t even stay in the room when the doctors told me.  Did you know that?  They still act like nothing’s happening, if they can help it.  If I try to talk about it, my mother cries.  They get upset.  They don’t want to think about it.”  He turns to Soonyoung and gives him a sardonic smile.  “Because it’s very hard for them, you know.”

Soonyoung wants to cry, but the last thing he wants to do is make this about himself.

“I don’t _want_ them to have to worry.  I don’t want anyone to have to worry, and there's nothing anyone can do, so I don't see the point of upsetting someone just because I'm scared.”  He pauses for a long time, looks out the window again.  “But it isn’t fair,” he says finally.  His gaze falls to his lap.  “I’m only seventeen.  It isn’t fair.”  His voice breaks.  He gives a shuddering sigh, and drops his head into his hands, shoulders shaking with sobs.

Soonyoung shifts onto his knees, pulling Wonwoo into a hug, tucking his head under his chin.  “Wonwoo.  You can tell me when you feel this way.  That’s why I’m here.”  He plants a kiss on Wonwoo’s head, and Wonwoo’s arms wrap tight around him.  “The only reason I didn’t push when I’d ask if you were alright—“

“I know.  I wouldn’t have told you.”  Wonwoo sniffs hard, untangling himself from Soonyoung.

“I still knew.”

“I know.”  He’s wiping at his eyes, tiny sobs still escaping, and Soonyoung pulls his sleeves down over his hands and gently raises them to dry Wonwoo’s cheeks at least a little.  All he wants to do is help, but he feels so, so useless.

“Is there _anything_ I can do?”  Wonwoo doesn’t look up at him, just shakes his head.  “I know I can’t…just, for right now, I mean.  Anything at all.  I’ll do my best.”

Outside, snow continues to fall, thicker and heavier than when Wonwoo arrived.  Soonyoung glances out the window, and then he can feel Wonwoo’s eyes on him.  He looks back, and he can barely hold Wonwoo’s gaze because of how intensely he’s looking at him.  Tears still cling to his eyelashes and his cheeks.  He doesn’t answer Soonyoung’s question.

“You probably shouldn’t go out in that,” Soonyoung says quietly, eyes flicking toward the window, because he doesn’t know what else to say.

Wonwoo still doesn’t answer, just keeps his eyes on Soonyoung.  It’s another few seconds before he speaks.  “It’s going to get worse.  Soonyoung, it’s going to get so bad.”

He wants to promise that things will be fine, and that he’ll find the cure like he said, but it doesn’t feel right.  “I’ll be here,” he says, as firmly as he can.  Wonwoo is looking at him with the oddest expression, and he just won’t stop.  Soonyoung is just starting to ask why when Wonwoo kisses him.  He makes a tiny “mmf” sound and almost pulls away, but Wonwoo’s hand finds his shoulder, hesitantly.  After a few seconds, Wonwoo’s lips move against his and he does pull back, just enough that he can meet Wonwoo’s eyes once he opens his own.

It’s confusing, and amazing.  It’s just...not what he imagined.

“Please,” Wonwoo looks at Soonyoung almost frantically, like he’s the only thing tethering him to the ground.  “I just…”

Soonyoung swallows.  “Are you sure?” he whispers, even though all the rooms have quieting spells on them.  “You’re _sure_?”

Wonwoo nods.  He looks scared, but Soonyoung is sure it’s nothing compared to how terrified _he_ must look.  “I am, I swear.”

So Soonyoung leans forward this time, and tries not to lose his nerve.  Instead of Wonwoo’s lips, he kisses his forehead.  Down the bridge of his nose.  He interlocks their fingers as he trails his lips across Wonwoo’s tear-stained cheeks.  He wants to tell Wonwoo he loves him, but he doesn’t think it’s the right time even though his heart is full to bursting.  It’s just that there’s this confusion he has to keep pushing down, uncertainty and fear and a million questions that boil down to _why now_.  Soonyoung does push it down, though, because it’s not as if he doesn’t already feel like all the air has been squeezed out of his lungs.  And he wants to kiss Wonwoo.  He desperately wants to be this close to him, doesn’t know how he’s going to be able to stand not being this close to him every second of the day.  When he finds Wonwoo’s mouth again, it’s feather-light—as soft a touch as he can muster—but after a few seconds Wonwoo sighs Soonyoung’s name against his mouth, and pushes closer and closer to him until he winds up in Soonyoung’s lap, and Soonyoung thinks, through how deliriously happy he can’t help but feel as his hands move to Wonwoo’s hips, that nothing will ever be feather-light again.

Not with the weight of Wonwoo pressing down on him.

  
_xiii.  wonwoo_

They become something of a local legend, a cautionary tale.  In their small town, they're the first curse of this kind, and people spread it around as a tragic tale of love and heartbreak.  In fairness, they suppose it kind of is.  It doesn't make Soonyoung any less sad the first time a boy comes through the woods and tells him his parents say if he misbehaves, he'll end up turned into a bird.  It doesn't make it any less frustrating for Wonwoo when he asks late-arriving visitors if they're looking to buy something and they respond _we just wanted to see,_ craning their necks looking for Soonyoung, who usually hisses at them.  They run away laughing, and Wonwoo will sigh as Soonyoung jumps into his lap.  “Kids these days,” he’ll say.  “I don’t think we were ever that awful, do you?”

But Soonyoung has his tells, even as a cat, and Wonwoo can see when the pressure starts to crack him.  The problem is that there’s not enough time.  Not within their meager minute at sunrise or sundown.  There just isn’t enough time for Wonwoo to reassure him as much as he can see Soonyoung needs, and there’s nothing he can do about it.  He settles for holding him as tight as he can, most times, and it doesn’t surprise him when one night as they’re waiting for sunset Soonyoung says his name against his chest as though it’s a lead weight.

“Wonwoo.  I want to break up.  I want you to break up with me.”

There’s no hesitation, because they don’t have time; Wonwoo just pulls him even closer, wrapping his arms around him as he says “Well I’m not going to do that, am I,” into his hair.

Soonyoung is stubborn, though, and keeps going; he barely pauses to breathe, clearly wanting to get this all out before nightfall.  “It isn’t fair for you to have to stay here with me when I did this to us.  You should hate me,” he says, even as he clings to Wonwoo tighter.  “I wish you hated me, even a little.  I can’t—I feel so awful, every day, because of what I did, and you’re always just acting like you’re fine with it—”

“Of course I’m not fine with it, Soonyoung.”

“Then yell at me.  Be angry with me.”  He sits up, disentangling his and Wonwoo’s arms.  “Wonwoo, leave.”   It’s impressive, how steady he keeps his voice even when looking Wonwoo in the eye.

They’ve gotten used to talking fast, but Wonwoo has too much to say.  It’s not like it’s anything he’s never said before, though, at some point or another, so he just reduces it to its basest form.  “Never,” he says, wishing Soonyoung’s face wouldn’t look so sad and ashamed and overwhelmed all at once.  “You didn’t know.  You couldn’t have known.”

Soonyoung bites his lip.  “I thought it would be me.”  He's so quiet, always so quiet when they talk about this.  “If I got caught, if anything happened, I thought it would be me.  I didn’t think—”

“I know.”

“I was just—”

“Soonyoung.  I _know_.”  He looks out the window, and knows he has to hurry.  “Being with you is the only thing that makes any of this bearable.  I’m not leaving.  I lov—”

The sun disappears.  Soonyoung turns into a cat before Wonwoo can finish his sentence.

  
_v.  soonyoung_

When Wonwoo’s disease starts to spread, it’s Soonyoung, of course, who notices.  They’ve closed up the shop, and they’re in the attic taking inventory when Soonyoung grabs his hand suddenly, turning it over in his, rubbing his thumb over the green spot on his middle finger.  Neither says anything at first, and Wonwoo’s eyebrows knit together in something that looks like annoyance.  He doesn’t cry this time.  Soonyoung does.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be crying.”

Wonwoo shakes his head.  He’s almost smiling, but not quite.  “You can cry if you want.”

“It’s selfish.”

Wonwoo raises an eyebrow.  “Why?”

“Because.  I don’t want this to happen to you.  But I also don’t want it to happen to me.”  He sniffles.  “I don’t know what I’ll do.”  He’s still holding onto Wonwoo’s hand.

“Soon-ah, nothing’s happening yet.  It’s barely spread at all.”

Soonyoung sighs, sits down in a chair, and squeezes his eyes shut.  ‘Now or never’ is, realistically, too immediate of a phrase to use in this situation, but it’s the one that comes to mind anyway.  “It’s just that I’m in love with you,” he says very quickly.

Wonwoo’s face reads sincere, genuine shock, candlelight reflecting off his glasses.  “Oh,” he says quietly.  Soonyoung’s eyes drop to the ground.  He can’t look at him, not until he says something real.  It’s a few more lingering seconds before Wonwoo continues.   “You are?”

“I have been for...ever.”  Soonyoung looks up at the ceiling, trying to hold back his tears, then back down at the ground when he can’t.  “I just thought I should tell you, in case…” He trails off when he feels Wonwoo’s hands on either side of his face, and looks up to meet Wonwoo’s eyes.

“Hush.  In case nothing.”

There’s a second where he almost lets that be that, but there’s something bothering him.  He reaches up and pulls Wonwoo’s hands away slowly, then stands.  “Yes, in case.”  Wonwoo looks at him curiously.  Soonyoung keeps ahold of his hands.  “Because I _love_ you.  And whatever we’ve been...doing...the past couple of months, I don’t know if it’s only because of how you were feeling that night at my place, but...”  He takes a breath.  “I want _all_ of you, Wonwoo.  Not just the parts that are afraid.  Not just the parts that don’t know what else to do.”  His voice gets softer as he watches Wonwoo’s eyes well up with tears and he’s whispering by the end.  He steps closer and tries not to regret telling the truth.  “I love those too, but I want the rest.”

Wonwoo’s voice is scratchy when he finally speaks.  “I didn’t mean to make you think—” he stops, looks at the floor.  “I’m sorry.  It's just...”  Soonyoung waits.  Wonwoo takes one of his hands back from him and wipes his eyes.  “It’s easier not to think about it.  Because if we...if I have you, it means I’ll have to lose you, eventually.”  Soonyoung shakes his head and his eyebrows draw together as Wonwoo takes a breath to steady himself.  “But if you want all of me, Soonyoung, it’s yours.”

It doesn’t connect right away, and Soonyoung just stares for a second.  Then he sighs, hard, and laughs breathlessly.  Wonwoo’s mouth curves up, just barely, before he’s laughing too, and is pulled flush against Soonyoung.  He holds Wonwoo, softly at first, afraid he’ll change his mind.  But it’s Wonwoo who tightens his arms around Soonyoung, and it’s Wonwoo who moves one hand to the back of Soonyoung’s neck, and when they meet each other’s eyes again Soonyoung knows.  They’ve come too far together now, crossed some threshold in the last five minutes, and the before and after of it is so distinct Soonyoung is sure he could reach out and touch the line of division.  On the surface it feels like this is how they’ve always been, like this is where they’ve been headed since they met, but...there’s more to it.  There’s a softness to Wonwoo that’s always been there but has never been so _open_ to Soonyoung; there’s this facet to what they are now that’s so, so different from what they were earlier tonight, even, let alone when they met.

“I love you,” whispers Wonwoo.

So incredibly, wonderfully different.

Like day and night.

  
_xiv.  wonwoo_

The books Soonyoung keeps on Wonwoo’s disease are worn out and dog-eared from the countless times he’s torn through them, hoping for a breakthrough.  What Soonyoung doesn’t know is how, years ago, Wonwoo would sneak out of his room and find the book the doctor had given his parents when he told them.  They’d never been forthcoming with the details, but Wonwoo wanted to know; it was scary, and it was horrible, but he at least thought he deserved to _know_.

Wonwoo doesn’t read the books Soonyoung has.  Tonight, he sits facing the bookshelf and just looks at them.  He doesn’t need to read them.  He can rattle off the specifics of his disease from memory.

_Status, non-contagious, incurable._ The green from his fingertips has spread up past his knuckles.  Wonwoo thanks his lucky stars (the few he has left) that cat-Soonyoung had been napping in the other room when he noticed.  Obviously, Soonyoung will find out sooner or later, but Wonwoo hates the thought of telling him.  He hates all of this.  Being cursed had made it so easy to forget he also had a deadly illness.  Before, it had always been there, just under the surface, but Soonyoung has a tendency to make that kind of thing seem so trivial, so tolerable.  The curse, however, took _being with Soonyoung_ away from him, and instead of thrusting his disease to the forefront of his mind, it pushed it even further down.  Lately he mostly found himself dwelling on all the things he was missing out on with Soonyoung thanks to their curse, and his disease just hadn’t seemed as important.  The same was true for Soonyoung, he was sure, though subconsciously.  Soonyoung had been so focused on trying to fix them that Wonwoo’s cure had fallen by the wayside, and Wonwoo could never fault him for it, but he also can’t bring himself to tell him he’s getting sicker.  He knows Soonyoung would never forgive himself.

_Symptoms, discoloration of the skin, headache, severe cough, loss of motor functions._ He works in his garden every second he can, watches it flourish as he withers away.  He never takes his gloves off if Soonyoung is near.  But he can only hide it for so long, and it takes Soonyoung less than a second after Wonwoo rolls his sleeves up without thinking to notice the green peeking out of the tops of his gloves.  He meows insistently, Wonwoo batting him away until finally he growls and sinks his claws into one of Wonwoo’s gloves, hitting his skin just enough to hurt.  Wonwoo winces, gingerly detaching Soonyoung from the fabric.  “I’m working,” he says sternly.   “We can discuss it later.”

_Life expectancy, varies._ “You should have told me,” Soonyoung says when it’s later, holding Wonwoo’s hands so, so gently in his own.  “I can’t believe you didn’t tell me.”

“You would have blamed yourself.  I didn’t want you to.  It’s not your fault.”

“I’m supposed to be saving you.”  He looks out the window, where sun rays are just starting to peek over the horizon.  “I was so close.  It was right there.”

Wonwoo sighs.  “Soonyoung...”

“Don’t.  Please.  I know whatever you’re going to say is going to be—depressingly sweet, or tragically romantic, either way it’s going to be very _you,_ and I can’t—whatever it is, it’s more than I deserve.”  He chews on his lip.  “How long, do you think?”  It’s only half a question, but Wonwoo understands.

“You tell me.  This,” he stretches out his forearms, “took a couple of weeks.”

“Anything else yet?”

“Some coughing.”

Soonyoung doesn’t say anything, just looks him up and down and worries his lip some more.

_Prognosis:  death._

“I didn’t keep my promise,” Soonyoung says, lip trembling.

“Soonyoung.”  Wonwoo kisses him once and smiles after.  Soonyoung doesn’t return it.  “You say that like you think it’s the only reason I’ve kept you around.”

  
_vi.  soonyoung_

“We should move in together.”

Interestingly enough, it’s Wonwoo who suggests it.  They’re on the balcony of Soonyoung’s room at the inn and it’s just rained—Soonyoung practically chokes on the misty, heavy air in surprise.  He looks over at Wonwoo, who’s grinning softly, and Soonyoung gives him a cautious smile in return.  Cautious, because he’s still as careful with Wonwoo as he can be.  His disease had spread slowly and steadily, until it covered the tips of his fingers, for six months.  It’s been still for a year.  They’re happy, but Soonyoung is still careful.  He knows they’re both incredibly aware that anything could happen, anytime—things could go bad very suddenly and very quickly.  Still, he smiles.  “You want to live with me?”

A few errant stormclouds roll in overhead, but any rain they might carry seems to be holding off.  Wonwoo shrugs, grinning.  “Yes.  It’s ridiculous that you’ve been renting this stupid room for this long.”

Soonyoung laughs.  “It’s not so bad, you know.  _My_ room has a quieting spell, unlike yours.”  He nudges Wonwoo with his shoulder, and Wonwoo nudges back.

“I mean _money-wise_ , obviously.  It’s not like we’re apart all that much anyway.  And when we are I think you miss me.”  Soonyoung snorts, but lets Wonwoo continue.  It’s not like he’s far off the mark, after all.  “This current arrangement just isn’t fair to you, Soon-ah.”

“I see.  It’s for my own good, naturally,” Soonyoung says.

“Naturally,” Wonwoo affirms, scooting closer to Soonyoung on the small bench and leaning against him.  It’s quiet between them for a moment and Soonyoung glances at Wonwoo.  He’s looking straight ahead, but his expression is—not sad.  More serious, maybe slightly bittersweet.  “Whenever you’re not around it just...feels like a waste of time.”  He clears his throat.  “Plus, you could probably magick us a house out of thin air by now, so I don’t know what we’re waiting for.”

It’s true, actually.  He could.  Even if he couldn’t, he doesn’t know what they’re waiting for either.  They’re in love, right?  That’s more than enough reason.  Soonyoung kisses Wonwoo’s cheek and grabs his hand.  “Okay,” he says, and Wonwoo’s face lights up.  “Let’s move in together.”

So they find a cottage, deep in the woods.  They make their living selling charms and potions—it doesn’t bring much money, but then, they don’t need much money.  Between Wonwoo’s garden and Soonyoung’s magic, they don’t want for much, and anything they need they get in town.  Once they’re settled, Soonyoung starts making trips further out than the village, coming home with old, old books, and strange plants that even Wonwoo hasn’t heard of, and various innards of animals that Wonwoo is pretty sure he doesn’t want to know the details of.  He has so many books on Wonwoo’s disease that they spill off their bookshelves and into piles on the floor, under chairs, in kitchen cabinets.  The first time Soonyoung actually tries a spell, there’s no effect—just a curl of smoke rising from the imortelle he’d burned and Wonwoo staring expectantly.  He cries, because what’s the point of how powerful he’s gotten?  What’s the point of having all this magic if he can’t fix the love of his life?

“You’ll get it,” Wonwoo says, rubbing circles onto his arm with his thumb.  “I know you will.”  Soonyoung knows he doesn’t mean it.  He knows Wonwoo only keeps reassuring him to make him feel better, and he loves him for it, but it makes him sick.  It’s not like he can blame Wonwoo —the odds are against him anyway, and plenty of people smarter and more powerful than him have been trying to find this cure for years.  They’ve all failed.  What’s the difference?

Soonyoung knows what the difference is.  The others might have been doing it for glory, or wealth, or notoriety, they might have even been doing it for love.  But none of them were doing it for Wonwoo.  They hadn’t seen Wonwoo smile, hadn’t held his hand, had no idea he existed, so they had no idea how imperative it was to keep him safe, keep him healthy, keep him _alive_.  Soonyoung was willing to bet, even if everyone thought he was crazy, even if Wonwoo, deep down, didn’t really think he could do it—that that difference would be enough.

  
_xv.  wonwoo_

They stave off the symptoms for as long as they can.  Wonwoo keeps the cough at bay by drinking sickly colored teas and potions as fast as he can brew them, and Soonyoung tosses pain relief spells his way on the hour for his head.  Eventually, though, Wonwoo can’t keep the potions down.  The spells no longer affect his headaches.  He’s green up to his shoulders, and it’s started creeping over his chest.  It seems to grow more every time he looks down.

“Soonyoung,” Wonwoo says one morning, close to dawn.  Tendrils of green have started to work their way up his neck.  He’s standing at the window, holding cat-Soonyoung against his chest.  “I’m sorry.  I’m sorry I had to be sick.  I’m sorry we won’t have more time.  I—” He cuts himself off with a cough, hacking until his eyes water.  Soonyoung growls.

It takes a minute, but Wonwoo finally gets his breath.  He had more he wanted to say, but his throat is so raw and it hurts to even breathe.  “Just... _please_ try not to blame yourself, alright?  You’ve tried so hard.”  He bends to sit Soonyoung on the floor, straightening with some difficulty, and turns back to the window as the sun comes up.  Once Soonyoung is himself he grabs him by the shoulders and spins him around to face him.

“Wonwoo,” he starts, bristling when Wonwoo rolls his eyes a little.  “You can’t talk like that.  I’m not letting you die, remember?”

Wonwoo’s shoulders sag, and he takes off his glasses, tosses them onto the sofa.  His hands are shaking.

“It’s too _late_ , Soonyoung.  We knew this might happen.  If I’m…it’s going to be soon, I think, and if it is I don’t want to waste that time watching you running around trying to break this stupid curse or chasing some cure that might not even exist.”

“No.”  Soonyoung grips his shoulders tighter, voice trembling with the effort of holding back tears.  “I told you.  It can’t have you.”  He shakes his head hard, like he can shake away the last few minutes, or the curse, or the disease.  “Please.  Wonwoo.  Please don’t give up on me yet.”

Wonwoo sighs, nodding hesitantly and eventually leaning against Soonyoung, only starting to cry once he’s let himself disappear into his arms.  If Soonyoung thinks he feels even smaller than usual, even more fragile, he doesn’t say anything.  Wonwoo turns his head to rest his cheek on Soonyoung’s shoulder, sniffling.

Soonyoung holds him a few seconds longer, rubbing his back until the weight of Wonwoo against him is gone and he feels feathers on his cheek.  He reaches up to scratch crow-Wonwoo’s head.  “You listen, Jeon Wonwoo,” he says thickly, tears streaming silently down his face.  “I don’t care that you don’t think I can do it.  I don’t care that you’ve squished the part of you that believes I can into dust because you don’t want to get your hopes up.  I’m going to fix you anyway, and you’re just going to have to deal with it.”

He abandons trying to break their curse altogether.  Wonwoo watches him search every second of the day for something, anything that could replace dragon scales in the ritual—hurriedly mutter his incantations once Wonwoo is human, try his best to observe the results before he’s a cat again.  It never works, but he starts over the next day.  Wonwoo can see it wearing him down, slowly, though he’d never admit it.

It’s not until the whites of Wonwoo’s eyes turn green that he starts to break.  He becomes frantic, barely sleeps.  Even as a cat, he’s restless and can’t stay in one place.  He’s usually out prowling the woods in case his cat brain or his cat eyes pick up something his human ones can’t, leaving Wonwoo alone through the night.  It’s exactly what Wonwoo didn’t want, but what can he say, when he’s doing it for him?

It turns out not to matter that much, as it’s barely more than a week before Wonwoo can’t stand on his own.  His vision goes blurry and he can barely take in his surroundings.  The only constant—the only thing he can still focus on, the last thing he makes sure he sees before he closes his eyes, because he’s not sure if they’ll open again—is Soonyoung.

Soonyoung, presently, is at the shop.  He waits until crow-Wonwoo settles for a nap, makes sure he’s really just asleep and not—well.  Visiting here will help, he thinks; he still finds comfort in its dim candlelight and the smell of books.  Jeonghan is closing up when he gets there, and he only has two hours until sunset—but he goes in anyway.  Jeonghan looks up as he does.  “Hey, Kitty.”

“Busy day?”

“The day before Valentine’s?”  He gestures around the room.  “What do you think.”

The shop is a mess, decorations everywhere, books haphazardly thrown on their shelves, and Soonyoung regards it before responding.  “I think you’re gonna get caught someday.”

“You know I won’t.  I’m sneaky.”  He flicks his wrist at the curtains on the east wall and they close, mutters a spell under his breath and the floor clears itself, the shelves straighten themselves.  Soonyoung finds it ridiculous that magic can do seemingly everything except the one thing he needs.

“How’s Seokmin?” Soonyoung asks, then glances around the shop.   _“Where’s_ Seokmin?”

Jeonghan comes over to the table and sits down.  “Asleep upstairs.  I told you, day before Valentine’s.  It’s been hell.”  He magicks them some tea.  “How’s Wonwoo?”

“Crow-like.”  Jeonghan smiles, but it’s not happy.  Soonyoung stares into his teacup for a few seconds before continuing.  “Horrible.  Worse every day now.”

Soonyoung watches as Jeonghan chews on his bottom lip for a second, seemingly contemplating something heavy.  “What is it?” he asks.  Jeonghan points at Soonyoung’s tea, and he watches as it darkens.  He sniffs it.  Whiskey.

“There’s a rumor...that someone has a cure.”

“What?!  Who?”

Jeonghan sighs and gives him a sympathetic look.  “Someone very powerful.”

“Jeonghan…”

A nod.

It’s almost funny.  “You can’t be serious.”  It would be funny, if it wasn’t her, if Soonyoung didn’t have this awful suspicion that he knew how she figured it out.  “Where did you hear this?”

“Remember the baker’s son?   Seungkwan? Just diagnosed this year.  He said his parents made a deal with her.  The price is...well, high.  She took...”  Soonyoung stares at him, and he continues with another sigh, gesturing vaguely at nothing with one hand.  “What do witches always want more of?”

She wants magic.  Of course she does.  Hilarious.  Soonyoung feels his whole body trembling.

“You saw him, though?  He’s really better?”

“Seems that way.  He said he felt different than he’d felt in his whole life.  I guess it’s really true you can’t catch it, you just _have_ it.”

“I’ve told you that a thousand times,” Soonyoung snaps, before he hangs his head and sobs into his hands, and Jeonghan does his best to comfort him.

“Kitty…” Jeonghan places a hand on his shoulder.

For one second, Soonyoung considers:  if he gives away his magic, his chances of breaking the curse drop to zero.  He still can’t even _be_ with Wonwoo, not really.  Just for a second— _is it worth it._ He shakes his head almost violently, hating himself for even letting it cross his mind.

“Soonyoung.  No one expects it of you.  You’ve done so much already.”  He pauses, and when Soonyoung doesn’t raise his head or respond, he continues.  “Also, not that I’m the authority on morality or anything, but the implications of giving all your magic to someone like that, no matter what it’s in return for…”

Soonyoung looks up then.  “I don’t care about any of that.  I’d do it.”  He sniffs hard, shaking his head again, slowly, resigned.  “She won’t take it.  Not from me.  She won’t cure him after what I did.”

Jeonghan leans back in his chair.  “I think you’re severely underestimating what a witch like that could do with magic like yours.”

  
_vii.  soonyoung_

“Where are you going?”

It must be well past midnight, and Soonyoung is crouched on the ground, lacing his boots.  He grins up at Wonwoo.

“I’ve had a breakthrough.  It just came to me.  I have to go get something.”

Wonwoo rubs his eyes, yawning.  “It can’t wait?”

“It can’t.  Genius waits for no one.”  He scoots over to the edge of the bed on his knees, leaning in to give Wonwoo a kiss.  “Go back to sleep, Nonu-yah.  I’ll be back before you know it.”  Wonwoo smiles, still half asleep, and Soonyoung kisses him again.  “I think this is gonna crack it.  I really do.”

He’s just out the door when Wonwoo calls out to him.

“Soonyoung?  What is it?”

He peeks back through the doorway.  “Hm?”

“What did you figure out?  What is it you’re going after?”

Soonyoung’s eyes sparkle.

“Dragon scales.”

  
_xvi.  soonyoung_

Soonyoung sets out at sunrise the next day.  He magicks the gate open this time, and she’s waiting for him at the door.  She’s not surprised, just acknowledges him like she’s been expecting him.

They agree upon terms.  They shake hands.  That’s all.  There’s no epic battle—Soonyoung’s no prince.  He doesn’t try to defeat her, he doesn’t try to re-negotiate; she already knows what he’s here for, already knows he’s willing to do anything.  She tosses a small bag his way, and Soonyoung peeks inside.  When she tells him it’s only fair, since he’s the one who tipped her off, he laughs—laughs until he cries, until he doubles over, until he can’t breathe.

He goes back to the shop on his way home, feeling lighter and heavier all at the same time.  Seokmin jumps as Soonyoung slams the bag down on the counter.  Soonyoung watches him glance at Jeonghan, and they’re both silent for a long, long moment—Seokmin covers his mouth and tears up, but Jeonghan just glances out the window and blows his hair out of his face.

“Nearly sunset, Kitty.  We’d better hurry.”

They make it with ten minutes to spare.  Jeonghan asks if there’s anything he can do, but Soonyoung’s set up this ritual so many times he could do it in his sleep.  Wonwoo lands on his shoulder—barely.  Soonyoung has to reach up and steady him.  He’s surprised he can even still fly.  “Just a little longer, Nonu-yah, okay?  Now you need to get down from there, or your ridiculous long legs are going to spoil my runes when you’re back to yourself.  Jeonghan, can you—”

Jeonghan gingerly picks up Wonwoo, placing him on the couch just as the sun dips below the treeline.

Wonwoo’s vision has gone mostly green by now, but even as a crow he can make out—it takes him a moment to remember, his brain sluggish.  Jeonghan, that’s right.  Now that he’s human again he wants to ask what he’s doing here, but his throat can’t catch up to his brain.  Wonwoo’s eyes move down to where Soonyoung is crouched on the floor, and his lips curve up, then he remembers he was gone all day and he has no idea why.  He shuts his eyes for just a second, clears his throat.  It hurts.

“Soonyoung, where have you been?” he asks, voice raspy.  “Jeonghan?”

“He’s here to help.”  Soonyoung speaks quickly, but smiles, very small.  Wonwoo frowns, looking apprehensively at the ground, where Soonyoung has chalked out the same runes he’s been chalking out for years.  But—”Look what I got,” Soonyoung says, holding up one pearlescent scale and grinning from ear to ear.  Wonwoo starts to ask _how_ , but Soonyoung just kisses him and returns to the floor.

Jeonghan reads the incantation from a piece of parchment, so fast Wonwoo can barely register it, let alone wonder why it’s him doing the reciting.  Soonyoung scatters and crushes and burns his ingredients and Wonwoo just watches, because he’s seen all of this before, and he’d stopped wondering long ago whether the dragon scales would really have made a difference.

Except—he can definitely feel something.  Soonyoung looks at him expectantly, biting his lip.  The feeling is overwhelming, like something inside Wonwoo is being yanked on from several different angles, and it makes his head drop forward, the effort of holding it up too much.  When he looks back up Soonyoung’s eyes go wide and his mouth drops open.  To his left, Jeonghan finishes the incantation and squeezes his eyes shut, catching his breath.

“I was right,” Soonyoung breathes, taking Wonwoo’s face in his hands.  “I knew it.  All this time.  I was _right_.”  He sucks in a deep breath, and exhales it fast, like he’s been holding it for years.  Maybe he has.  He laughs, and rolls his eyes toward Jeonghan.  “ _Fucking_ dragon scales.”

Jeonghan smiles, still looking winded.  Wonwoo just stares at Soonyoung, feeling very warm and _very_ different.  He’s just started to smile back when the sun goes down.

Immediately, cat-Soonyoung hops into Wonwoo’s lap, purring loudly.

Wonwoo looks down at him, places a hand on his back—he freezes.  He pulls his hand away, holds it out in front of him, does the same with the other, turns them over again and again.  There’s no green in sight.

“He did it,” says Jeonghan, and Wonwoo’s head snaps up to look at him, faster than he’s been able to move in weeks.  “He actually had it figured out.  I—” He dabs at his eyes, sniffling.  “Love is amazing,” he says, shrugging.

Wonwoo can barely breathe.  “Dragon scales?  But how did he get them?”  Jeonghan purses his lips and suddenly he has an awful feeling.  “What did he do?”

There’s a deep, labored sigh from Jeonghan, who sits next to Wonwoo on the sofa.  “I suppose it’s just as well if I tell you.  Kitty, you don’t mind, right?”  Cat-Soonyoung just keeps rubbing his head against Wonwoo’s arm, and Jeonghan laughs.  “Feeling awfully full of yourself, aren’t you?”

“Jeonghan.”

He looks down at cat-Soonyoung, then back up at Wonwoo.  “Well,” he starts.  “He went back to the witch.  And he made a very bad trade.”

  
_viii.  soonyoung_

Wonwoo had gotten a cold once.  That’s what Soonyoung remembers now, as he returns home, freshly thieved dragon scales in tow—that cold, and the cough that had come with it.  He remembers Wonwoo’s cough, because coughing is a symptom of Wonwoo’s disease.  He had known, logically, that the coughing was from Wonwoo’s cold; it wouldn’t make sense for the disease to be manifesting itself like that yet, since at that point Wonwoo had three green fingertips and nothing more.  What’s more, he had to have heard Wonwoo cough at _some_ point since he’d learned of his disease, so it made no sense for this cough to have this effect on him.  Still, Wonwoo coughs, and Soonyoung freezes.  His eyes stick on whatever word he’d been reading in whatever book he’d been buried in as Wonwoo coughs from across the table.  Soonyoung knows.  He knows it’s silly and it’s paranoid, because he knows Wonwoo has a cold.  But it’s the first time he considers how short their time together could be, how the disease could spread at any moment, how after it started there was no telling how fast it would take Wonwoo from him.  He knows this cough isn’t deadly.  But what about the next?

Soonyoung remembers how Wonwoo had cleared his throat and looked up at him.  He had squinted in confusion at Soonyoung’s expression and asked what was wrong.

He remembers responding:  “You know I would do anything for you, don’t you?”

Wonwoo had grinned a little, looking even more confused.

He hadn’t smiled back, just continued, serious.  “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do.”

Soonyoung shakes himself out of the memory but hesitates before moving through the doorway to their bedroom.  Instead, he leans against the doorframe and looks in at Wonwoo.  It’s quiet enough that he can hear Wonwoo breathing if he listens close, holds his breath.

He’d hold his breath forever for that sound.

  
_xvii.  wonwoo_

Wonwoo flings his arms around Soonyoung as soon as he’s no longer a cat.  “You idiot,” he sobs.  “You absolute idiot.  I—you can’t—we’re still—” Soonyoung laughs.

“Wonwoo,” Soonyoung says, stepping back out of Wonwoo’s arms, “It doesn’t matter.”

“It does.  It matters.  Soonyoung.”  He takes a second, collecting his thoughts so he can get more than three words out at a time, as Soonyoung looks him up and down. “What kind of life can we have together like this?  We can’t live on two minutes a day forever—“

“I can.  If that’s what we’ve got I’ll take it.”  He laughs a little.  “It’s much better than the alternative.”

“Your magic…”

Soonyoung furrows his brow, shaking his head.  “There’s more than one kind, remember?”

A sob escapes Wonwoo before he can stop it.  “We’re stuck like this now.”

“I don’t believe that.  I cured your incurable disease.  We’ll find someone who can fix us.”  Soonyoung brushes Wonwoo’s hair out of his face and grabs his hands, kissing his knuckles.  “We have plenty of time.”  He glances out the window, then back at Wonwoo, grinning.  “Quick, before you go, how does it feel?”

Wonwoo considers that.  He considers telling Soonyoung how proud he is, how sorry he is for ever doubting him, how grateful he is, how in love he is.  He takes a breath and smiles, shakily.  “It feels like we have plenty of time.”

The sun comes up with Soonyoung smiling in its first rays of light, as if things are perfect, as if he doesn’t care what’s about to happen, what happens every day; and right then, Wonwoo finds he doesn’t care either.

It’s not ideal.  But it could be much, much worse.

**Author's Note:**

> \- i'm so sorry for making them so sad, and for possibly making you sad if you read this.  
> \- thanks to swn, who have been waiting A Good Long While for this one.  
> \- especially thanks to olivia kristen and kait!!!!  
> \- kitty soonyoung is an abyssinian :3  
> \- i'm @wonuza on twitter, come say hi ♡


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